The Performer
Posted on October 31 2020
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Author S Colombo
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The Performer │ 15 October - 9 November 2020
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The performer is someone that (either consciously or unconsciously) performs an act before a various public - it can be random people walking on the street as well as the intentional public one finds at museums and theatres. During this process, where action is the heart of the performative happening, photography plays a precise role - or, on a closer look, a multitude of roles. On the one hand, it becomes the means through which we document a theatrical or artistic performance, as shown by the thorough documentation of Gina Pane’s, Viennese Actionism’s, as well as Marina Abramovic’s performances for example. On the other hand, it becomes art itself, as a visualisation of a specific occurrence, as a bidimensional expression of something happened in a certain place at a certain time.
Somehow, a similar variability is reflected in the artworks exhibited at “The Performer”, arranged at Spazio Millepiani in Rome as one of the events of WeFo2020 (Weekend Fotografici). This group exhibition, opened to the public from October 15 to November 9 2020 shows selected works that capture everything and its opposite. The ordinary and the extraordinary, a fast uniqueness and a repetitive slowness, the sublime as well as the daily life. When photography fluidly merges with our existences, the result is an excerpt from life itself, theatrical pieces, emotions that are difficult to express in other ways, through other media.
Somehow, a similar variability is reflected in the artworks exhibited at “The Performer”, arranged at Spazio Millepiani in Rome as one of the events of WeFo2020 (Weekend Fotografici). This group exhibition, opened to the public from October 15 to November 9 2020 shows selected works that capture everything and its opposite. The ordinary and the extraordinary, a fast uniqueness and a repetitive slowness, the sublime as well as the daily life. When photography fluidly merges with our existences, the result is an excerpt from life itself, theatrical pieces, emotions that are difficult to express in other ways, through other media.
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In an almost endless range of possibilities, some nuances and topics are brought into focus, playing the main role within this context. For some artists, the performance is a way to reveal a feeling or a status that makes us unsatisfied or overwhelmed. Like the incommunicability caused by the use of unknown linguistic codes and by the clash between different cultures that erect walls, barriers, impediments. Like the imponderable or the uncanny that is captured in a shot, frozen in an instant - never complete, different every time. Other pictures tend to highlight the spiritual side of the artists working behind the camera. These images are transformed into documents that represent the tension and duality between the human and the transcendent. This ritual, either sacred, heathen or supernatural, is a leap of faith we decide to accomplish, here and now. Visuality, instead, is at the centre of other artworks, where certain choices that refer to colours, poses or structures tend to evoke feelings and expressions.
In the end, there are no performances without human beings and there are no human beings without bodies: these are the authentic protagonists, the red thread guiding us through the exhibition. A body moving, changing, but also striking bizarre and paradoxical poses, that compose a new sarcastic family album, for example. A corporeality that acquires experiences and knowledge, but it is also able to relate to the surroundings - in dialogue with nature, the human context and society. A physicality that affirms its role in the world, capable of living of memories, but also sculpting new identities, day after day.
In the end, there are no performances without human beings and there are no human beings without bodies: these are the authentic protagonists, the red thread guiding us through the exhibition. A body moving, changing, but also striking bizarre and paradoxical poses, that compose a new sarcastic family album, for example. A corporeality that acquires experiences and knowledge, but it is also able to relate to the surroundings - in dialogue with nature, the human context and society. A physicality that affirms its role in the world, capable of living of memories, but also sculpting new identities, day after day.
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Brett Studholme, Salt Mandala Performance No. 2
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Brett Studholme, Salt Mandala Performance No. 1
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Mariya Andriichuk, Synergy
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Marie Simonova, Incandescent Soul
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Luke Jordan, Pictures from the Studio: Reflections on Learning to Draw
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Alejandro Zertuche, Arise / Maria Wetshtein, The Garment for Myself
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